View Full Version : Anyone found an AMRAAM?
Wokkafans
7th Aug 2018, 20:24
https://twitter.com/holger_r/status/1026860068166348801
VinRouge
7th Aug 2018, 20:32
https://twitter.com/holger_r/status/1026860068166348801
MADDOG.... :eek:
Blinking lucky nothing was in the way....
NutLoose
7th Aug 2018, 20:33
"But it's not ruled out it landed on the ground"
That's gravity for you, it sucks
CargoOne
8th Aug 2018, 00:41
I guess any particular details of investigation will be classified but still it is a good question how exactly did it happened. Press is reporting both Spanish Eurofighters serving policy mission in Baltics are called back to Spain with immediate effect. Whatever happened it is a good luck it was north-bound and did not captured any civil airliner around the area. Be it east-bound, there is Russian 76s Airborne Troops Division based in Pskov, well within AMRAAM reach from the firing point - imagine the consequences!
F-16GUY
8th Aug 2018, 03:27
First of all, lucky it did not bring down an airliner. Scary to think about the potential outcome.
Would be interesting to know if it was an unintentional release (finger-trouble), launched as either a MADDOG or against a FCR target by mistake, or if it was an inadvertent release caused by a system malfunction. If not an airliner it could have been Pierre flying around in his Deux Mille, acting as opponent on a 2v2 training sortie, sucking it up or defeating it with electrons.
Would also be interesting to know how the Amraam is mech'ed on the Typhoon, and what procedures Pedro has in place for training flights with live missiles.
In the Viper it takes at least four switch actions to fire the Amraam. Select Master Arm switch to ARM, select A/A mastermode (or MSL OVRD/DGFT mode), designate on a target to get a FCR lock (or depress and hold manual range/uncage for MADDOG), press the pickle button. I assume its roughly the same steps in the Typhoon.
I always regarded flying an armed QRA jet as redair, on A/A training sorties as an accident waiting to happened, yet in my airforce we do it on a day to day basis. Of course we have procedures in place and so on, but it does not take more then a short lapse in concentration, in the heat of the fight, to forget that one has live missiles under the wings. It has happened before and it will probably happened again.
Harley Quinn
8th Aug 2018, 05:27
25 May 1982
14 Squadron Jag GR.1 XX963/AL shot down 35 miles north-east of Bruggen by 92 Squadron Phantom FGR.2 XV422. Pilot ejected safely. Definitely a Sidewinder, presumably an AIM-9L.
As ORAC rightly says, when your unique cockpit safety feature/indication that you are carrying live rounds is duct tape what can possibly go wrong :eek:.....I assume the world has moved on ....:ooh:
25 May 1982
14 Squadron Jag GR.1 XX963/AL shot down 35 miles north-east of Bruggen by 92 Squadron Phantom FGR.2 XV422. Pilot ejected safely. Definitely a Sidewinder, presumably an AIM-9L.
It wasn’t me, I wasn’t there (honest).... but whilst the F-4 force (in the U.K. at least) was just getting 9L’s in early 82 I’m pretty sure the missile involved in this accident was very fortunately a 9G. I say “very fortunately” because the opinion was if it had been a 9L the Jaguar pilot might have suffered a much worse fate (due to different fusing logic and warheads, Golf vs. Lima.....and to think those pesky QWI’s thought I was asleep during their Friday PM lectures)..
As to why that one happened, well there are various versions of a long story but if you train day in, day out to operate certain switches in an almost automatic manner......
Just This Once...
8th Aug 2018, 06:24
Yep, a Golf with a perfect continuous-rod slice through the back end of the Jaguar. At that time the UK and Germany based RAF Phantom force was purely AIM-9G equipped as the UK fleet had just gone from Lima back to the Golf and Germany had remained with the Golf.
The story I always remember about the above Jag engagement was reference a GAF F-104.
When all the calls were being made on 243.00 and the word was spreading, the F-104 pilot called ATC on climb-out from low-level aborting his planned “red air” mission and requested routing back to base. When base asked ATC for a reason for his early recovery he replied, “because the British are playing hard rules today”.
Davef68
8th Aug 2018, 10:14
Yep, a Golf with a perfect continuous-rod slice through the back end of the Jaguar. At that time the UK and Germany based RAF Phantom force was purely AIM-9G equipped as the UK fleet had just gone from Lima back to the Golf and Germany had remained with the Golf.
Because all the British Limas were elsewhere? :-)
Where they proved just as effective.....
charliegolf
8th Aug 2018, 11:26
As ORAC rightly says, when your unique cockpit safety feature/indication that you are carrying live rounds is duct tape what can possibly go wrong :eek:.....I assume the world has moved on ....:ooh:
I assume the world has moved on to employing pilots who 'just know' when they are carrying live weapons in peacetime!
CG
chopper2004
8th Aug 2018, 11:32
25 May 1982
14 Squadron Jag GR.1 XX963/AL shot down 35 miles north-east of Bruggen by 92 Squadron Phantom FGR.2 XV422. Pilot ejected safely. Definitely a Sidewinder, presumably an AIM-9L.
My lab techs at my uni in aerospace engineering lab worked with said Jag pilot as an apprentice, prior to him joining the RAF, hence I heard this story 2 decades ago.
cheers
And I did my sin-bin Ops Officer tour at Leuchars with Alistair, the Nav, who was on his.....
I assume the world has moved on to employing pilots who 'just know' when they are carrying live weapons in peacetime!
And it was that sort of assumption that led to the F4/Jag shootdown accident in the first place....
Not sure how well versed you are in the full details of what happened that day but as I understand it and have heard it (from one of those involved) chuck in the standard pressurised exercise scenario in RAFG, then add a slightly unusual/possibly controversial decision from on high about the carriage of the weapons, then miss a piece of duct tape, then add a bit of pressure to get a trigger pulse on film, and.......
I know all those involved know darn well it shouldn't have happened, but I gather one well known aviation psychologist consulted at some point about the event said that given the nature of the training he was suprised it didn't happen more often...
So yes, I would hope the Forces have moved on from simply relying on duct tape to break a sequence of highly rehearsed motor actions.
charliegolf
8th Aug 2018, 11:58
That took much longer than I thought it would!:ok:
I get the complexities, but couldn't resist.
CG
Lonewolf_50
8th Aug 2018, 12:05
Just glad it wasn't heading eastbound. That could have gotten rather nasty at the political level.
In 1987, one of our Tomcats hit one of our RF-4's over the Med. In that case we lost a bird.
In this case, nobody got hit, so there's a small blessing to this serious case of not having your head on right.
NutLoose
8th Aug 2018, 12:28
https://defenceoftherealm.wordpress.com/2015/10/27/the-jaguar-that-got-foxed-by-a-phantom/
Remember it well as I was at Bruggen
I was 185/8000nm at the time and we regarded it as professional jealousy!
then miss a piece of duct tape One of the issues was that so much duct tape was being used that the supply chain had made it a V&A item and getting hold of it was just about impossible - and the Sqn ran out.
One of the consequences being that they then ordered so much so much that they giving it away on request for the next couple of years.
Lyneham Lad
8th Aug 2018, 14:12
I spent the Whitsun period plotting where the wreckage had come down...
Fortissimo
8th Aug 2018, 14:38
As I remember the RAFG event (including discussions with Alastair) there was a late aircraft swap, no A/C ARMED boards, no white tape on the Master Arm, no Telford on the front scope (normal with live loads other than QRA/Battle Flt), a weapon system that looked and sounded pretty much the same with live or sim missiles, all nicely wrapped up with a Stn Cdr decision to fly armed aircraft for training and missiles that could only be flown once fully armed (motors, fuses and warheads). No human factors in play there, then. "March the guilty bastards in..."
ISTR the published BOI report made much of the organisational errors, which may explain why the Scottish officer made possibly the most successful intercept of his career - in the admin office, preventing copies reaching the 43 Sqn crew-room, presumably in case the accident was contagious. Unfortunately he couldn't do much about all the other copies on the Stn. :E
Fortissimo
Yep, sounds pretty much like the version of events I heard from somebody else who was there.
Anyhow...any news on the whereabouts of this AMRAAM thingy?
Fortissimo,
I also vaguely remember a CB in the back seat that was partially pulled but was still making a connection?
Does Typhoon not have a ‘Training Mode’?
The SHAR had a Training Mode - didn’t prevent a dump, pilot reset, and a practice bomb going through 3 decks into a mess room......
Ah yes, I was on the BoI! We were able to prove that it was NOT the pilot's fault but a software glitch. Good job it wasn't a concrete 1000 pounder. - Glug! Mind you, the 28 lb practice bomb only missed the LOX plant by a few yards, which would have been spectacular to say the least, possibly incandescent.
Having said that, it was a bleedin good bomb - straight between the tramlines at the radar centroid.
Swing the lamp and pass a midshipman.
mog
A Training Mode wouldn’t have worked then, though, would it as the pilot was actually trying to release stores.
The SHAR training mode such that it was simply meant the armourers fooling the aircraft into thinking it was carrying a store that it wasn’t by setting the correct channel code in the port leg tube and corresponding store on the Ballistic Setting Unit behind the seat.
glad rag
9th Aug 2018, 09:10
It wasn't "duct tape" that was specified, it was red 1/2 inch specific to task tape.
So specific that the bombheads managed to run out of it!!
And the holes in the cheese lined up just like that...in fact iirc they used black tape instead handy that, however I also remember a white cross being left in position from the adhesive on the back of the tapes....
In the early 1980s, a USAFE F-15 had an in-flight uncommanded sidewinder launch. It was retrieved only because a German farmer eventually noticed a hole in the roof of his barn, which led to finding similar breaches of the hay loft and concrete floor.
Wingless Walrus
10th Aug 2018, 22:46
I would keep an eye on eBay over the next few days. I also bet the pilot concerned is spending every spare minute scouring the Estonian countryside; they probably told him its coming out his wages.
A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away... I once worked on Typhoon & AMRAAM.
From what I can remember the switchology to fire one was not that complicated.
The system wiring and carriage is specifically designed to prevent inadvertent firing, in a whole variety of failure situations. I would be surprised if this is a system failure, if it is it has ramifications for all Typhoons/AMRAAM.
I would be interested to hear from the learned sky warriors here on what they think of the idea of conducting air combat training with live missiles only 50 km from the Russian border.
Would that not have been thought of as too risky? I could imagine intercepts being practiced, but full on hectic furballs with live weapons? Would this also not allow the Russians to easily monitor tactics/performance?
Has there ever been a case before where an AMRAAM fired without command from the pilot?
JSF-TC
10th Aug 2018, 23:02
Surprised that while the press release stated 'launch', no-one here has considered the possibility what really happened was a 'jettison', where the missile was ejected in an un-powered, and un-targetted 'dead' state.
There have been many cases of unplanned, inadvertent jettisons, either through finger trouble or an aircraft fault. A lot less steps involved in a jettison compared to an actual launch.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TCG_Muavenet_(DM_357)
Jettison vs Launch
We’ll have to ask a Typhoon expert - but in 2 of the warplanes I’ve flown you couldn’t jettison A-A weaponry - because the system was designed for the situation where you wanted to EMERG JET due to threat - and denuding oneself of A-A weaponry in such situation would be dismal.
In fairness, on a third type you couldn’t jettison belly AMRAAM or wing mounted AIM-9 - but you could get rid of wing mounted AMRAAM.
F-16GUY
11th Aug 2018, 08:26
Surprised that while the press release stated 'launch', no-one here has considered the possibility what really happened was a 'jettison', where the missile was ejected in an un-powered, and un-targetted 'dead' state.
There have been many cases of unplanned, inadvertent jettisons, either through finger trouble or an aircraft fault. A lot less steps involved in a jettison compared to an actual launch.
Thats because Air to Air missiles and the way they are mounted on the missile rails, precludes jettison. As far as I know there are no aircraft that can jettison Air to Air missiles. For the missile to leave the rail it has to either move forward and clear the entire rail, or to slide aft. It does not just fall off like a bomb does when the hooks release the logs. Only way to get rid of a missile is to fire it. The Amraam will normally not respond to launch command (pickle) if the system does not have a target (FCR lock). That can however be overridden by a command to launch it as a Maddog. Sidewinders and the like will launch instantly when the pickle switch is depressed. They don't care if there is a target or not. They just go "whoosh".....
Regarding jettison of Air to Ground munitions, it takes as many steps (switch actions) to jettison them as it does to drop dem on a target. Only way to drop them in one switch action is to press the Emergency Jettison switch. This switch is normally guarded by some sort of breakable plastic or a flip away cover that prevent accidental activation. And should you use the Emergency Jettison switch, you will not only loose one bomb, but you will jettison all the stores that can be jettisoned including bombs and fuel tanks.
Regarding tactics close to the border, I am pretty sure that both the Spanish and French detachment in the baltic area, have very restrictive SOP's on what they can practice in that area, including which mode of operation they are allowed to use on their radars and EW systems. Most of the time they are probably only practicing close control intercepts to train the local GCI controllers.
orca beat me to it... orca, how did the jettison of the wing mounted missile work on the type you describe? Was it by jettison of the entire rack maybe?
Yes indeed, twin weapon racks on underwing pylons - hence they would go with the EMERG JET leaving you with the belly AMRAAM and your wing tip weapons.
I can’t remember if there were any stringent jettison limits - I can only imagine a twin rack tumbles in a way that a drop tank or A-S store might not.
As an aside - I’ve flown completely unguarded EMERG JET - no time for priming/ uncovering in the ‘poor launch/ soft cat’ cases - technical point only. Have a great day!
JSF-TC
11th Aug 2018, 10:52
Whilst AIM-9 & ASRAAM are rail-only mounted weapons that do not have a jettison capability, AMRAAM and AIM-9/ Sparrow/ Skyflash/ Phoenix have both rail and ejector carriage capability.
F4, F3, Sea Harrier, Typhoon, F-14, F-15 (and more) all have (had) the capability to carry their longer range AA missiles on ejector mounted stations. I know for certain that Sea Harrier had an AMRAAM jettison capability when carried on the fuselage gun-pod ejector stations, so assuming all the other 'ejector' mounted platforms did too.
Wingless Walrus
11th Aug 2018, 11:23
It is a very long time since I worked on Typhoon, prior to it being in service. My memory is very sketchy but I can remember a few things.
Jettison
Two types: Emergency Jettison (EJ) and Selective Jettison (SJ)
EJ will dump everything that is allowable, by pressing the EJ button.
SJ will blow off the group of allowable stores previously selected by the pilot, by pressing the SJ button.
The system knows what stores are fitted and what stores cannot be jettisoned.
I have a vague recollection that wing mounted missiles could not be jettisoned because they were rail mounted, as mentioned a bit earlier in this thread.
In any case the EJ/SJ buttons are hard to hit accidentally, as you would expect; the last thing you want is to dump all your stores accidentally (including external tanks). They were mounted on the left panelling, not on the HOTAS, so hard to press accidentally.
The Late Arm and firing trigger are on the stick.
The Telegraph has stated that the missile was fired:
"A statement from the Spanish Ministry of Defence confirmed that a missile had been accidentally fired by one of their Eurofighter jets".
That there was so much concern about the missile hitting other airborne aircraft also suggests that it was fired rather than jettisoned.
Reports indicate that the likely location of the missile is ten's of kilometres from where it was released, again suggesting a fired missile rather than jettisoned.
F-16GUY
11th Aug 2018, 12:14
Whilst AIM-9 & ASRAAM are rail-only mounted weapons that do not have a jettison capability, AMRAAM and AIM-9/ Sparrow/ Skyflash/ Phoenix have both rail and ejector carriage capability.
F4, F3, Sea Harrier, Typhoon, F-14, F-15 (and more) all have (had) the capability to carry their longer range AA missiles on ejector mounted stations. I know for certain that Sea Harrier had an AMRAAM jettison capability when carried on the fuselage gun-pod ejector stations, so assuming all the other 'ejector' mounted platforms did too.
There you go, I just learned something new. Thanks for the info JSF.
etudiant
11th Aug 2018, 12:57
The Telegraph has stated that the missile was fired:
"A statement from the Spanish Ministry of Defence confirmed that a missile had been accidentally fired by one of their Eurofighter jets".
That there was so much concern about the missile hitting other airborne aircraft also suggests that it was fired rather than jettisoned.
Reports indicate that the likely location of the missile is ten's of kilometres from where it was released, again suggesting a fired missile rather than jettisoned.[/QUOTE]
That seems an interesting approach to missile firing, launching without a target in view.
Of course an AMRAAM can expect to get cues from the launcher to engage its seeker, so maybe the launch sequence is more accommodating. Can anyone help clarify?
JSF TC,
Quick re-attack. Can I challenge your fact that one could jettison FA2 AMRAAM?
My challenge is based on the jettison panel only having pads for the five weapon stations excluding the gun pod racks - vertically in line with the selector switches for the pylons themselves, which were below.
The ‘Clear Aircraft Bar’ punched them all at once.
The guns were switched on with switches to the left.
How would one have jettisoned a missile without a switch that did so?
I also recall the second easiest Question of the Day: How do you jettison an AMRAAM? Answer: You can’t.
I standby to be corrected! I don’t suppose you have ACM or FRCs? I can only find the Tac FRCs and they don’t refer.
I did enjoy re-discovering the GR7/9 sidewinder jettison drill:
Master Mode: A/A
Late Arm: Live
Trigger: Pull Sequentially
superplum
11th Aug 2018, 15:50
JSF TC,
Quick re-attack. Can I challenge your fact that one could jettison FA2 AMRAAM?
My challenge is based on the jettison panel only having pads for the five weapon stations excluding the gun pod racks - vertically in line with the selector switches for the pylons themselves, which were below.
The ‘Clear Aircraft Bar’ punched them all at once.
The guns were switched on with switches to the left.
How would one have jettisoned a missile without a switch that did so?
I also recall the second easiest Question of the Day: How do you jettison an AMRAAM? Answer: You can’t.
I standby to be corrected! I don’t suppose you have ACM or FRCs? I can only find the Tac FRCs and they don’t refer.
I did enjoy re-discovering the GR7/9 sidewinder jettison drill:
Master Mode: A/A
Late Arm: Live
Trigger: Pull Sequentially
IIRC, ac release/jettison is all rather simple stuff!. If the whizzbang is mounted on a launcher (rails), then it can be jettisoned by clearing the pylon - you lose the launcher as well!. If it is fuselage/conformal loaded eg Tor F2/3, then it is released by ERU function to clear the ac prior to motor ignition. Those ERUs should be available for safe jettison too. After all, who would wish to attempt a "wheels up" with AMRAAM loaded to fuselage stns. As for the FA2, only one centreline pylon which could be cleared by jettison as already mentioned.
Wingless Walrus
11th Aug 2018, 17:50
Post by orca (" I also recall the second easiest Question of the Day: How do you jettison an AMRAAM? Answer: You can’t.") fits with my faded memory of Typhoon. During development the system would not jettison a functional AMRAAM but it would jettison a dummy AMRAAM (a kind of missile manakin) from the fuselage stations. I am not sure how it works on operational aircraft.
glad rag
11th Aug 2018, 19:05
To "safely" jettison a missile it needs to go in an inert state.
You can lob a 'winder of a rail as only the (seperate) motor fire line is energised. Whoosh....
Same with 'flash/sparrow, as has been said, energise the eru carts and the rams throw it away inert.
If 'flash or sparrow were on a rail you still have seperate motor fire lines to, this time, let it help itself away, but remembering you now have an inert, very explosive, high speed, sub telegraph pole stooging about the atmosphere.
Unfortunately I will have to stop here, any further comment on more "modern" equipment would be ill advised....but I think you get the jist...
JSF-TC
11th Aug 2018, 22:46
Orca,
Good questions.
27+ years ago, in the early 90's, I worked flight test (FTE) on the original Sea Harrier/ AMRAAM development at BAe Dunsfold and then at Eglin AFB. Time dulls the details, but we certainly had a jettison capability on our development test aircraft (ZA195 and XZ439). We used that jettison capability to prove the safe separation of AMRAAM CATM/ MSV inert shapes over Lyme Bay ahead of the Eglin firing trials. I was not specifically involved in those initial separation trials, but I recall (maybe incorrectly) that the C/L station jettison switch on the WCP was used. It is possible that we wired our test jets up differently than the subsequent production fleet jets to get that specific capability. I do recall that we flew the AMRAAM test missiles (IAV, IMV, ITV) specifically non-jett by not fitting the LAU cartridges, as those test weapons were not cleared for jettison.
I could have sworn from memory that we had a Emergency Jett capability for the fuselage AMRAAMs, useful to help out as a last-chance during a poor ski-jump launch.
Again, production jets may have been different than our highly modified test aircraft that we worked with.
glad rag
11th Aug 2018, 23:44
The Telegraph has stated that the missile was fired:
"A statement from the Spanish Ministry of Defence confirmed that a missile had been accidentally fired by one of their Eurofighter jets".
That there was so much concern about the missile hitting other airborne aircraft also suggests that it was fired rather than jettisoned.
Reports indicate that the likely location of the missile is ten's of kilometres from where it was released, again suggesting a fired missile rather than jettisoned.
That seems an interesting approach to missile firing, launching without a target in view.
Of course an AMRAAM can expect to get cues from the launcher to engage its seeker, so maybe the launch sequence is more accommodating. Can anyone help clarify?[/QUOTE]
Errr..Nope.
charliegolf
12th Aug 2018, 18:17
Regarding jettison of Air to Ground munitions, it takes as many steps (switch actions) to jettison them as it does to drop dem on a target.
That flies in the face of the safety brief I got when I bagged a back seat Harrier trip in Germany. I was shown an unguarded strip of switches/buttons, bottom left of the instrument panel (yellow and black framing them?) and told that pressing them would jettison everything hanging under the jet. Was that wrong?
CG
2 TWU
12th Aug 2018, 18:28
Didn't the F4 have a 'Clear Aircraft' button that blew everything from the wings and fuselage in one action? IIRC, was used at Leuchars when a Q jet became temporarily unsure of position and short of gas.
CG,
The advice you were given was spot on. In the simulator the Clear Aircraft Bar only needed to be depressed a few millimetres and all the stores on the five stations would go.
However, in fairness to the earlier poster - his machine has a different system for different reasons.
https://news.err.ee/859836/stray-missile-investigation-suggests-pilot-error
Stray missile investigation suggests pilot error
An internal Spanish military investigation has concluded that the accidental firing of an air-to-air missile in Estonian airspace by a NATO jet on 7 August resulted from pilot error, according to Spanish daily El País, quoted in Estonian daily Postimees.
While the overall investigation into the incident continues, anonymous military sources claim that fault lies with the pilot in the misfiring of an AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM), from a Spanish Airforce Eurofighter Typhoon.
The paper claims that investigative tests show the pilot initiated the missile firing sequence during training. Normally, safety mechanisms should stop the actual launching in such cases, so the incident is reportedly rare. However, weapons systems on the Typhoon multi-role, multi-national fighter are particularly complex and varied.
The missile was fired over Pangodi village, near Tartu, and is thought to have impacted in or near the Endla bog, about 100 km north. The Estonian/Russian border lies about 60 km east of Pangodi. The plane was flying at around a 6,000-metre altitude at the time.
Six hundred hectares of Endla bog was searched in the following days using equipment, with a further 200 hectares checked visually, yielding no trace of the missile or its debris. No reported casualties or material damage resulted from the incident, though brush fires broke out in the aftermath of impact.
Other investigations into the misfiring are still ongoing.
Navaleye
10th Sep 2018, 08:46
Presumably it would have proximity fused with the nearest solid matter?
I presume that at some point it safed and ultimately acted as a lawn dart and is below the limit of their metal detectors.
meleagertoo
10th Sep 2018, 10:41
Do these things fall intact when the fuel is exhausted and not self-destruct? Would it not explode on landing or is the fuzing not set up for that?
Seems a shame to make a present of the damn things to a potential enemy.
No chance it flew off into Russian territory, is there?
No chance it flew off into Russian territory, is there? (notasamod)
The world would have likely heard about it had that happened. As we have not heard ...
I can only think of one Safe Arm Device or similar which ‘safed’ in deceleration having successfully ‘armed’ in acceleration - and that was a design fault!